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Deadwood Parade 1888


Ghost Cowboy is about real tales from the 19th-century American frontier, when the Old West was young. Most of the posts here are actual news items from the 1800s and early 1900s. We'll be adding "new" content every week. Travel with us and sign up for an account, and you'll be able to leave comments and post in our forums. Your trailmasters, Ken in Alabama and Dave in Virginia, don't get to saddle up and vacation out west as often as they'd like, so they started this site. Drop us a note.

frontiersman


CHINESE MINERS SHOT DOWN.


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New-York Times. September 4, 1885.

CHINESE MINERS SHOT DOWN.

A WYOMING CAMP CLEARED OF ITS CELESTIAL LABORERS.

ROCK SPRINGS, Wyoming, Sept. 3. -- The largest coal mines in the entire Union Pacific system are at Rock Springs, 250 miles west of Cheyenne. The company recently imported a large number of Chinese to take the places of the white men employed. Yesterday afternoon, the entire force of white miners, about 150 strong, organized, and, arming themselves with shotguns, marched to Chinatown. After firing a volley into the air they reloaded and ordered the Chinamen to leave. The order was obeyed at once, the Chinamen fleeing to the hills like a drove of

A GAMBLER'S BOAST.


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New-York Times / April 2, 1886

DURANGO, Col., April 2. -- C. L. Creek of this place, is a gambler and has a bad reputation. A feud of long standing has existed between him and Marshal Heck, and Creek has frequently boasted that Heck could not take him alive. Yesterday afternoon a warrant for Creek's arrest was placed in Marshal Heck's hands, and the two men met in front of the Post Office. When 20 feet away the Marshal, with drawn revolver, ordered Creek to hold up his hands. The answer was a shot from Creek, the ball passing through Heck's body, near the right nipple.

Bisbee 1909


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Bisbee, Arizona, in 1909, with the Copper Queen mining operation and smelter just out of view to the left. Click here for a panoramic version of the photo.

WESTERN TERRORS.


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Fort Wayne Daily Gazette / December 11, 1883

Capture of a Frontier Town by Five Armed Desperadoes,

Who Kill Three Men, Wound a Woman and Ride Off With Twelve Hundred Dollars Booty.

dancerTOMBSTONE, Ari., Dec. 10. -- About 11:30 a couple of couriers reached Tombstone from Bisbee with news of a bloody tragedy enacted in that camp a few hours previously. Shortly after 7 o'clock a party of men well mounted and heavily armed rode into town, and when within a hundred yards of the store of A. A. Castanada dismounted, and, leaving their horses in charge of two of their number, five of them boldly walked up to the store. Three of the party, it is stated, entered the store and the others remained on the outside. Just what transpired in the store is not yet known, but a few minutes afterward, the sound of rifle shots rang out from the

 

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